But buried in that anti-style history, is the reality that Dad Pants... often are representative of a mindset that puts personal vanity at the end of a long list that includes school drop-offs, soccer practice, yard work, saving for college and the grind of a 9 to 5....

ADDED: Here's the Dockers ad Givhan is critiquing, in which Dockers purports to be the solution to the problem that is Dad Pants:

34 comments:

Dockers are terrible work pants. I've been buying Duluth or Carhartts for years now. Dockers rip too easily. That's fine for dress pants... but Dockers aren't that, either. Can't work in them, can't go out in them.

Robin Givhan can tell women what to wear till the cows come home. But I wish she would not try to argue that men need to forego comfort for style. The only time a man needs to worry about style is his wedding day, his daughter's wedding day and his funeral. The rest of the time he should be comfortable. Any man who cares what Givhan thinks isn't a real man anyway. A dumb story by a stunningly shallow person.

If they could just make us men more style conscious, just think of the otherwise perfectly good clothes we would replace annually. Think of the money to be made. It's almost un-American to resist this.

Dockers can be nice for casual fashion, because they don't really scream "fashion", pleated front or not. They actually look nice on the right body shape. If you have any sort of belly, pleated pants look bad. If they don't fit your waste right, they look terrible.

I wear Dickies work pants for my job at the Harley shop and sometimes around town. They are as sturdy as Carharts and not as heavy. I wear jeans otherwise. Or sometimes tropical style shorts. Just to drive Ann bananas.

My then Sophomore-in-High-School son and his friends put together a LAN party that required the renting of the local convention center. I accompanied them to negotiations, because they were too young to sign a contract. I told them to dress in a business-like manner, not in blue jeans and t-shirts. They wore Dockers and buttoned shirts, with neckties.

The manager of the convention center kept apologizing for his attire (well-pressed and nice-looking sort of a Hawaiian shirt), because the lads looked so sharp in their Dockers. He gave them a massive discount on the convention center because he said they looked like they were going somewhere, and he wanted to encourage that.

Americans have generally favored flat fronts even on suits and Brroks Brothers offered nothing but flat fronts until the late 1980s when they were acquired by the British fim Marks and Spenser at which point pleated trousers were the only ones on offer with their suits. Fashion has now reversed that and both styles are now available.

tim in vermont: If they could just make us men more style conscious, just think of the otherwise perfectly good clothes we would replace annually. Think of the money to be made. It's almost un-American to resist this.

They're trying to make you more fashion-conscious, which men should rightly resist. As should women. Now, having style and being well-dressed, that's a different matter. (Stylish people have small closets and clothes they can wear for years, or even decades.)

2. Low rise trousers are an abomination unto heaven, a cheap trick to save on fabric. They are passable on people who are extremely skinny. On anyone normal size and up, they look absurd. Trousers should hang from the waist. If you don't like the way that looks, then diet -- you're not going to look any better in low rise trousers.

3. Even if Dockers is calling its trousers slim fit or some such rubbish, I'd be shocked if that's anything other than vanity sizing. I have "slim fit" shirts from Lands End that are practically indistinguishable from their normal shirts. They fit roomily, and I'm far from slender.

The idea of these things isn't to make them fashionable -- it's to take them (back) in an inch or so and let the men who were going to wear them anyhow feel better about themselves. Well, that or the people picking these labels are delusional.